The Perfect Vessel
by Nelarun
Summary: A vessel is something that contains and protects an object. Urahara didn't need a vessel to hide his creation - he needed the impossible - a perfect vessel. Staring at the baby he had found in the Rukongai, he decided that he may have found such a thing.


**The Perfect Vessel**

A Bleach fanfiction

by Nelarun

I do not own Bleach or any of the characters mentioned.  
>(though I wouldn't mind owning Urahara) <strong><br>**

**Thanks be to my brother who agreed to read it over.**

Kisuke Urahara was walking through the streets of the Rukongai late one night – not that the inhabitants seemed to realise that this time of night one should be in bed. The lower parts of Rukongai were as lively if not livelier at night than during the day. He absent mindedly dodged a gang of children and continued walking. He had a secret – and not a normal secret like the time he broke Yoruichi's mother's vase, or the time he accidentally set fire to Ginrei's ornamental garden (and though Kisuke had never admitted anything, the head of the Kuchiki Clan had never looked at him in the same friendly light afterwards). This secret was his greatest invention... and his worst. It was the most devastating of everything he had ever created – ever would create again. Those few select members of Central 46 had seen to that.

Dodging another gang of children he continued down the road past houses as large as his room that held five or six families. It was both pitiful, and yet perfect. The districts didn't get any bigger, but the population in each district increased significantly. He felt a hand reach into his pocket and his hand latched onto the bony wrist. Turning around he looked into the wide purple eyes of his would be pick pocket. She had to be new to the district, for her to be as bad a pick pocket as she was. "Sorry, girl, but these pockets aren't for picking." She pulled her wrist free and turned to dart away but he caught her other wrist. "Over there. Do you see that man." He glanced at a man dozing against a tree. "He looks like he's dozing, but he's fast asleep. His left pocket has coins, his right has boiled lollies." He released her and she darted off. He watched as she glanced at him once more before she darted across to the sleeping man and picked his pockets. She was definitely new, she had no skill. He frowned and turned, continuing down the road and putting the girl out of his mind.

Two hours had gone by. Urahara had followed the curve from South to West Rukongai. The West was a little wilder than the South, but he found it focused his mind a little more – allowing him to think more on what he needed to do. This time, instead of walking through the main street, he took the streets that wandered past the silent residences, the red lanterned brothels – one of the only ways a girl (and some boys) could earn a living in these districts – and finally stopped. There was a small bundle resting against a house, making soft, pitiful mewling sounds. He silently walked over to the bundle and picked it up. A baby! Urahara had never felt happier in his life – and it wasn't because he was holding a baby and fatherly instincts were coming to the fore. He had found the perfect vessel, the perfect way to hide his greatest invention and worst mistake. He could hide it in a soul – this soul. One of many hundreds of thousands in this district alone. He was almost ecstatic. The child would grow up – it would merge with her soul, it would be protected and virtually undetectable. It was the 'virtually' that worried him. Of course, he knew that unless one was standing right in front of the girl and knew exactly what to look for, one would never notice it.

Urahara didn't quite know how he would explain the presence of the girl to Yoruichi, so he chose to not inform her... of anything. Yoruichi would ask too many questions and cat-demon she may be, but when she found something of interest, she latched on like a dog with a bone – never letting go until _she_ was finished with it. He tucked the baby girl against him and darted away, dashing through the districts with the bundle held tight against him, using his fastest shunpo and arriving before the moon hit midnight. He nodded to some of the guards and walked lazily into his main laboratory, moving to the back, through a door and into his own private laboratory, setting the girl down he reached into his pocket, setting the sealed Hougyoku down next to the girl before he sat down and began designing his next invention – working out the maths and science behind implanting a foreign object in someone's soul and allowing it to stay there. An hour before dawn he put his pen down, picked up the papers and walked over to the grizzling baby. "Guess you're thirsty huh." He pocketed the Hougyoku once more and stepped outside, locking the inner officer carefully. He turned around to see Hiyori staring at him.

"You're acting strange," she accused.

"I always act strange," he replied walking past her towards the kitchen – he had to get some water for the girl, maybe even some milk. No not milk – she would start craving the milk instead of water, not a good idea for a girl of the Rukongai.

"Yeah, but you're acting stranger than usual." Hiyori fell into step beside him and he looked down at her in surprise.

"I am?"

"Uhuh."

"How?" he challenged.

"It's not even dawn and you're up! I usually have to haul your lazy backside out of bed after midday!"

"Eh? You wound me with your possibly accurate accusations." Hiyori scowled and he sighed. "Truth of the matter? I haven't gone to bed yet."

"Why not?" She asked, some hostility bleeding from her posture. "Are you feeling alright?"

"Yeah, yeah. Just needed to work on something, almost finished the calculations – then I'll get Mayuri to create it while I take a nap." They walked into the kitchen and he poured a cup of tea and grabbed a jug of cold water and another smaller cup before he turned and walked away.

"And that! What's that!" Hiyori shouted as he left.

"Hiyori-san! Please, you'll wake everyone up!"

"Bah," Hiyori grumbled under her breath. "As if. Now tell me what's going on."

"I'm baby sitting," he replied almost truthfully.

"Liar." Hiyori folded her arms and glared at him.

"I am not!" He replied.

"Of course you are!" She shouted. "Who would trust you with a baby?"

"Well, if you promise to stay quiet – not silent, just quiet – you can see her."

He unlocked the door to his inner office and stepped inside – glad that he had, sometime in the night, taken a quick break (the baby having forced him to change her – an experience he never wanted to repeat) to clean her up and settle in her a warmer blanket. Hiyori looked into the wide eyes of the baby.

"She's young." Hiyori finally murmured. "Who does she belong to?"

"You know, I don't know," Urahara replied after a moments thought.

Hiyori blinked at him before she forced herself to not hit him – she was all for violence, but not in front of the baby! "You mean you just picked her up?"

"She was abandoned in the Rukongai! Starving too!"

"So you're giving her water?"

"Well I'm putting her back where I found her – and I can't give her milk can I?"

"And why not?" Hiyori was almost screeching now and the baby started crying, a sharp keening moan. "And what do you mean 'you're putting her back where you found her'"

"That's the responsible thing to do!" Hiyori glared at him and picked the baby up, rocking her slightly.

"Give me the water."

"You know how to look after babies?"

"No." She growled. "But I've seen others round the place – can't be too hard."

"Ah." Urahara watched as Hiyori gave the water to the baby.

"So what's her name?"

"I dunno. I've just been calling her 'baby' or 'you'." Hiyori glared at him again. "I've been busy!" he defended himself and she shook her head in despair. "Speaking of which," he plucked the now sated baby from Hiyori. "Don't you have things to do?"

She glared at him again and started walking away as he put her back in the blanket. "Oh and Hiyori-san. Don't tell anyone about the baby."

She turned to him. "What?"

"Especially not Mayuri or Shinji." She looked at him before she nodded slightly and closed the door.

Urahara looked at the baby and gently sedated her, making sure she was completely unconscious – he may be callous, but he was never cruel. Mayuri had handed him the completed device with a questioning look, one Urahara had cheerfully ignored before he closed the door once more. "So... girl." he couldn't name her, no matter how much he wanted to – naming would mean that he would be forming a bond with her and that he couldn't allow. After today, he would never see her again. "This is it. Either your soul will accept this or it will destroy you and I'll have to find another." He gently pressed the device against her breastbone and the skin appeared to melt away, leaving a – comparatively – large dark hole, in which the sealed Hougyoku was placed. He withdrew the device and waited. The hole closed up and nothing happened – the girl didn't turn into spirit particles, or start screaming bloody murder, she just continued sleeping. He closed his eyes and began searching for the Hougyoku. It was barely there on the edge of his consciousness. If he didn't know where to look, he would have missed it completely. He picked the girl up and kissed her forehead. "I'm sorry, girl. But thank you." He tucked the girl under arm and walked out. Hiyori was leaning against the wall.

"So you've finished your experiments on her and you're just gonna dump her."

"That's right." Urahara nodded.

"Then what?"

"Write a report and send it to Central-46."

"Not the Soitaichou?"

"Not this time, Hiyori-san." Kisuke looked in the distance, the sun had set a few hours ago. Hiyori didn't look impressed but she didn't follow him either as he walked out of the division.

The old woman looked up when Kisuke knocked on her door. "Another orphan?" she grumbled as her bony and gnarled hands reached out to take the baby. "What's her name then."

"Dunno." Kisuke replied. "Don't really care either." He handed the girl to the orphan keeper – a cruel woman who taught all the orphans how to live in the lower districts of the Rukongai. The woman looked down at the baby and turned away, dismissing Urahara from her mind. Urahara turned away, a twinge of guilt pulling at him to go back, take the girl and raise her in a safe environment, before he squashed it reminding himself that the girl was safest here, in the mass of crushing bodies, in the filth and stench and despair that was Inuzuri. Far more safe than if she were in Seireitei. Here all she could lose was her life, in Seireitei she could lose her soul and not return to the cycle. So when she began crying for his friendly arms and careful embrace, he lowered his chin and continued walking, hands in the pockets of his black coat and pretended that he was deaf. The child wasn't his responsibility any more. After tonight, he would never see her again.

A/N  
><em>A common misconception among Bleach fans is that Urahara hid the Hougyoku inside Rukia when she got her Gigai. This is not true – he hid it inside her <em>_**before**__ he fled SS. The gigai was to turn Rukia human so the Hougyoku would be hidden for ever. If Urahara had it on him, then Aizen could have gotten it whenever he wanted – he knew where Urahara was, but somewhere it states that by the time he figured out where the Hougyoku was hidden, it was out of his grasp because Rukia had __disappeared in the Real World. So this is my version of how Urahara got the Hougyoku inside Rukia._

_Somewhere along the line, it mentions that Aizen discovered Urahara's Hougyoku in the Library, so I'm gathering that Central-46 found out about his research into the Hougyoku, and after he sealed it away, he wrote his report for C-46 and they sealed it and placed it with the rest of the reports in the Library._

_Oh and my brother mentioned that he didn't like the 'Englishified' way I wrote Urahara's name at the beginning. (having the first name first and the family name last). While I agreed with him, I decided to keep it Englishified. I deeply apologise if you prefer it the other way too! I still hoped you enjoyed it! ^_^_


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